Come and Go
by manicmethod
Summary: She comes and she goes. We try to stay away from each other. We'll just end up hurt and we know it, sneaking behind Beck's back like this. But she's like my own personal brand of drug and I'm hers and we keep running back together. Inspired by several songs. Happy angsty Valentine's day.
1. Brightside

_I'm having difficulty with the next chapter of Masquerade...stubborn thing just doesn't want to be written. I know what's supposed to happen, it just won't. _

_As of late, I have been listening to The Killers and Panic! and there were a few songs that were similar-ish and I thought they'd make a great angsty Jori fic. This story's gonna be pretty short and I'm in a very writey mood, so it should be done within a week or two. I'm sorry this chapter doesn't reach my 2000 word minimum :(_

_The song for chapter 1 is Mr Brightside by The Killers. You can listen to it or not, I don't care. I usually try not to incorporate songs into my stories as I feel it's like forcing my musical tastes on my readers, but this idea was too good to pass up._

* * *

**It started out with a kiss****_  
_****How did it end up like this****_  
_****It was only a kiss, it was only a kiss**

XXXXX

_It happened again last night. We keep coming back to hurt ourselves, time after time. I tell her we should stop. She agrees, but then arrives at my window not three days later saying she couldn't help herself. We sleep together then, everytime. It's addictive, she's addictive, and if she hadn't come back to me, I know I'd just go after her instead. Everything about her, I've grown to know and love it by now. Her body is familiar against the palms of my hands, her moans, my name spilling from her lips, her hand fitting perfectly against all of me._

_On weekends she would stay, curled up against me. I kind of love that. It lets me know I mean something. She's always reluctant to part from me, so on the days we have off, we milk time for all it's worth. Sometimes we talk, about trivial unimportant things, we never let it get serious and dampen the afterglow. But then her phone would buzz with a message from Beck and she would leave, albiet unwillingly, and I would let her go, because she doesn't belong to me._

I'm only half-listening to André as he babbles at my locker about his grandmother locked him out again. My attention is focused on the exchange currently underway between Beck and Jade. From the looks of it they're fighting again. I can only imagine what it's about. Jade probably over reacted to something and Beck's making a big deal out of it. They argue over such silly little things I wonder why Beck hasn't left her yet, as I so hoped he would. I know why Jade won't break it off.

I'm lost in my thoughts and so I don't notice when Jade come storming over to me, Beck in tow.

"Janitor's closet, now!" she snarled. I followed without remark. I always ended up being dragged into these things anyway. She practically flung Beck into it and I went in quickly, hoping to avoid the same treatment. Jade slammed the door behind us.

"Vega, tell him where I was last night." Oh, this. We had a story.

"She was at my house, talking about stuff."

"Stuff?" Beck said, his jaw setting, "what kind of stuff?"

"Girl stuff," I tried.

"What were you talking about, Jade?" he addressed his girlfriend now. I could see in her expression she was already extremley agitated.

"I thought I might've been pregnant, okay?" she yelled at him. I know she didn't, but saying she might have been send another little stabbing reminder through my heart that, not only was she still with Beck, she was still, on occasion, screwing him. His face paled so quickly that I almost laughed.

"You're not right?" he stuttered. Jade just rolled her eyes in response. Beck nodded, still a little shaken,

"But wait we always use-"

"I'm not sure I want to hear this!" I yelled and attempted to slip out, but Jade grabbed the fabric of my shirt to stop me.

"Condoms break, Beck. I was just making sure. I missed my period and I felt sick a lot. It's probably stress. I wasn't even going to tell you." Beck nodded again, a habit that was starting to get on my nerves, before he made his way over to the door.

"I'm just going to...head to class. I'll see you later," he stated before ducking out and closing the door behind him. Jade still had a hold on the back of my shirt. I moved my hand to brush hers off, and instead she grabbed my wrist and pulled me against her. She ducked her head and tried to catch my lips, but I turned my head to the side and she ended up pecking my cheek. She sighed.

"What's wrong?"

"You're still sleeping with Beck," I mumbled as I buried my face into the crook of her neck. She sighed again, and I could feel her shoulders rise and fall against me. She released my arm and started tracing invisible patterns on my back, "why?" I voice mostly to the empty air of the room.

"Because I love Beck, Tori. I like you, a lot. I should only have one of you, but I want both."

"That's selfish."

"That's me, Vega. I've been deprived of so much already in my life, as much as I want you, I can't give up Beck." I placed a kiss on the hallow of her collarbone and rose my head up to meet her eyes. They were hooded and withdrawn, I couldn't see anything she didn't want me to.

"Jade, there's nothing I want more right now than you. I blame that on my messed-up hormones. That's probably all it is for you too," I paused to push myself away from her, "I know I've said it before, but I think we should quit this," I told her for the hundreth time. Again, as always, she nodded in agreement, placed a light parting kiss on my lips and left the closet.

Four days. We lasted four days this time. A record for us, and most surprising because I expceceted her the first day, as she was still fairly peeved off at Beck. But she came knocking at my window four days after, whispering how they'd been the hardest four days of her life before falling into bed with me.

But this time the clothes stay on.

It was a Saturday, so when we woke up, we didn't do anything. We were still wrapped up in each other. Silent, unmoving, I could feel her breathing against me. Her mascara from yesterday, usually so carefully tended to, had run down her face and stained it. I closed my eyes around noon, enjoying the sensation that was Jade and I. She must've thought I'd fallen asleep because she slipped out again once her phone rang. I heard her conversing in hushed tones with whomever was on the other end.

"Alright Beck, meet you there."

My mind went to and remained in the worst possible situations for the rest of the day.

XXXXX

**Now they're going to bed**  
**And my stomach is sick**  
**And it's all in my head**  
**But she's touching his—chest**

XXXXX

The next time I saw Jade was Monday. She didn't even acknowledge my presence When I ask her a question, 'how was your weekend,' she tells me to shut up. Her and Beck, they seem to be doing great now, and he announces they've decided to spend the summer between graduation and college travelling in his R.V. No prizes for guessing what I assume they'll really be doing.

Every few days leading up to summer though, she comes. Sometimes we just lay. Others something more. I still don't know what's happening, and it's tearing me up, how much I wish it was Jade-and-Tori instead of Beck-and-Jade. The envy is forever making me sick.

They days after graduation, the day before Back and Jade are set to leave, I confront her. I march up to her door, pausing momentarily to realise it's the first time in almost a year I've been at her house. She answers the door, her hair pulled back, and she in sweats and an oversized shirt that I notice with a stab belongs to Beck. She's confused, and lets me in, telling me she was in the middle of packing and I cut her off.

"What are you doing?"

"I told you, I've been-"

"What are you doing with Beck?" She stops, her lips set into a line. She grabs my arm and leads me over to the couch to sit down.

"Vega, he's my boyfriend, and you're my," she paused to think of a word.

"Booty call?" Jade flinched at my harsh tone, "Jade, I'm getting tired of this. I know you can be a gank, but you're just being a downright selfish bitch. And all this time, I've just let you use me. I've been waiting, for you. No boyfriend, or girlfriend or any other secret paramour. I'm getting sick of waiting."

Jade was silent for a long time after that. I was going to say something else but she got her words out first.

"I...never asked you to wait Tori," she said, before rising and making her way upstairs to her bedroom. I assumed I wasn't invited.

XXXXX

**I just can't look its killing me**


	2. Better

_This took a little longer than I though it would. And it's still too damn short. Still I like writing these kind of fics, where it's all angst and first person shit. They're kind of fun. The theme of this chapter is "But It's Better if You Do" by Panic! At The Disco, one of my all-time favorite bands. As I've said previously, give it a listen or not. It really doesn't make a huge impact on your reading experience._

* * *

**Now I'm of consenting age to be forgetting you in a cabaret.**  
**Somewhere downtown where a burlesque queen may even ask my name**

XXXXX

It's been three years. Three years since she left on that trip. We still see each other from time to time, but I'm trying to forget her. I've not been to bed with her either. I think that's a good thing, a sign of moving on. But, I haven't exactly moved anywhere yet. I'm sort of trapped in limbo, ducking in and out of strip clubs, sleeping around, trying to find whatever it was Jade took with her. I haven't found it yet.

That isn't to say I haven't dated since. The opposite actually, I seem to go through both boy and girlfriends faster than a box of Kleenex in winter. Like I said, I've been searching and there was nothing with them that there was with Jade. But I'm determined not to let the lingering feeling of her control my life.

The old gang is getting together for a week away. We're going to DisneyWorld to embrace our inner children. They're all coming, André, Cat, Robbie, Beck and...Jade. I've got this nervous sensation in the pit of my stomach. I want to see her again, I haven't since Christmas, almost five months ago, and even then it was only for a few hours, but at the same time I want to stay as far from her as possible incase I can't hande myself. I've shed a fair few tears over her already.

When we met up at the airport, Jade gave a small smile and didn't speak. It bothered me. Five months and not a word to say to me. I busied myself with Cat instead, whom had, since last I saw her, begun dating Danny again after they'd run into each other at the mall one day. When I approached Robbie on the matter he looked ready to burst into tears. Still not over her I guess.

I was, fortunetly or not, I'm still pretty unsure, put beside Jade on the plane. We had no interaction until she nudged me awake to ask if I wanted anything from the food cart. I told her no, but she bought me some Peppy Cola anyway.

"We're gonna be spending the week acting like children Vega. We can ignore one another then."

After that comment we talked. She had gotten back together with Back again, they broke up just before college started in order to focus on their studies, and they were doing alright, a lot fewer fights than in high school. I could have done without hearing that of course. I told her about my own love life, but I'm not sure if 'love' was the right word to use.

Through our small talk it became clear to me that Jade considered our little night time escapdes as nothing of any substantial importance. It was something to joke about with friends in a bar while comparing all the mischief had in younger years. And I was the butt of the joke. Jade never said it, never even hinted at it, but it was all in the subtext. Telling me how happy she was now, with Beck, how he might even be 'the one' and her tone towards me. Friendly. Not at all loving.

After unpacking in our rooms, boys with boys and girls with girls, it was already dark and so we all made our way down to the hotel resturaunt for a bite to eat. The gang started catching up properly now. Beck hadn't seen anyone but Jade since Christmas, and everyone was currently filling him in on anything Jade hadn't deemed important enough to pass on. I was zoned out, sometimes staring at the doors to the kitchen hoping for food, sometimes staring at the happy families I thought pessimistically to myself that I would never have and other times staring at the side of Jade's head.

"Tori?" I focused in on Beck now, who was questioning me with an amused expression.

"Huh?" I gaped dumbly.

"What have you been up to?" he repeated his question. The table had gone silent and everybody, even Jade I noticed with the same weird feeling I'd had before the trip, was looking at me expectantly.

"I've been, you know, uh, keeping busy. Work and everything." Beck nodded and the silence grew awkward. The food came just then thankfully.

Once we'd finished, they André and Beck wanted to grab a few drinks at the bar, whilst Cat dragged Robbie to who knows where. Jade decided to stick around, but I only downed one drink before returning to the room.

I'm half undressed when she comes in. I can tell right away it's was her from the clunking of her boots on the wooden floor, which are promply and unceremoniously kicked off against the wall. I become hyperaware of everything, including the fact I'm standing here in a room alone with Jade, in nothing but my bra and a skirt that really doesn't help much. But nothing happens. She simply shrugs off her jacket and collapses in a heap on the bed.

On my bed.

Her stuff is all over another bed, and I don't want to take Cat's because it's the top bunk and I've never been good with heights, so I continue getting changed, and lay on the bed next to Jade. I hope she won't say anything because she's been drinking. She doesn't and instead does something I expect even less. She throws an arm across my stomch and snuggles up to me, something she hasn't done in years, and even back as teens, it was rare.

"Jade-"

"Shh, don't ruin the moment," she scolds. Before either of us have a moment to think of the consequences, our clothes hit the floor.

XXXXX

**I'm exactly where you like me you know,**

**Praying for love in a lapdance,**

**and paying in naivety. **

**XXXXX**

It all continues long after DisneyWorld. She comes once a week to my dinghy little apartment. Sometimes we just talk, or watch bad TV. Other times she stays over. I've stopped going to clubs. I don't need them right now anyway, now that I've gotten Jade back. To some extent. Beneath it all I know I'm still not a option. She has Beck. Beck is all she really needs.

We're at the park. Hanging out as friends. She's sitting on one of the swigs and I'm on the ground at her feet, picking at daisies and threading them through her boot's laces. Beck is back home in Canada visiting family. His family are still weary of Jade after all this time, so she's staying at home. Well actually she's staying with me, but only because she says 'it's too damn quiet without somebody snoring' to which I replied that I don't snore, to which she only scoffed at and provided no verbal answer.

I get up and run to buy ice cream as the van comes along, and when I get back Jade's removed several of the small flowers from her shoes. When I hand her hers and sit down again, she puts the half-finished daisychain she'd made in my abscence on top of my head.

That night would be the last night I'd spend with Jade West.

Beck comes home the next day and Jade leaves. I don't hear from her again for a week and when I do I wish she hadn't.

"Tori, we'll have to call it quits."

"Why?"

"Beck, he...we're getting married."

XXXXX

**And I wouldn't be caught dead in this place **


	3. Author's Note: All Is Well!

To all the readers who still have hope for this story. Thank you for never losing faith. After receiving one particular review about how this sort of story was too predictable, I had to do a little bit of thinking. Eventually, I came up with a solution to the predictability. However, about two months ago my laptop overheated and broke, and I was only able to take it in for repairs about three weeks ago. There was good news; my laptop had been saved, and bad news; in order to get it working again, they had to replace my hard-drive, meaning I lost EVERYTHING. Including the start of the next chapter, and the list of songs each chapter would be based on. But don't despair! Once I figure out what those other songs were, I'll be able to get writing again, with Come and Go at the top of my priorities. Expect the next chapter within a few weeks, and thank you for sticking by me.

~manicmethod


	4. Sins

**Oh, well imagine,**

**As I'm pacing the pews in a church corridor**

**And I can't help but to hear,**

**No I can't help bu tto hear an exchanging of words.**

**xxxx**

It's been six months since they got engaged. Six months of empty cigarette packs and bottles for me. Six months of meaningless sex and forgotten names. Six months of searching for what I've lost. Six months of dying. The wedding is next week. I got an invitation, but Ill be damned if I see her again.

André knows, I had to tell someone. He was disgusted, not just with me, but with Jade too. He kept quiet about it though, since I told him we've stopped. He comes by every few days to make sure I'm still alive. If you can call this living. He wants me to quit it and get my act together, stop drinking, stop smoking, stop sleeping around, but these things are strings that keep me from falling apart entirely. Sometimes I feel like it might be easiest to grab a pair of scissors and sever those strings.

I make a living off gigs, being hired for events and such, birthdays, and weddings mostly. I suppose it's as close to my real dream as I'm ever going to get, and it just about supports my lifestyle. I've made sure to book myself out for next weekend so I have an excuse not to see her get married. It's awful, I know, and I wish I could go to see Beck and support him on his day, because after everything, I really can't blame him for taking what was never mine in the first place. But I know it'll just hurt too much.

Cat came over earlier, to see if I was sure I couldn't go. I was happy for her, Jade had chosen her to be the Maid-of-Honour and as such, Cat had taken it upon herself to make sure everyone came. I told her I was sorry, I couldn't go, and she seemed to accept it, but as she was leaving she turned around to me."I know and Jade were never the best of friends, but surely you could forget whatever happened between you two, just for the most important day of her life."

And only when the door had closed and she was long gone did I break down crying. Forgetting is easier said than done Kitty, believe me, I've been trying for almost five years.

**Xxxx**

"**What a beautiful wedding,**

**What a beautiful wedding!", says a bridesmaid to a waiter**

**"And yes, but what a shame, what a shame**

**The poor groom's bride is a whore"**

**xxxx**

I decided to go. I'm not sure why, and I'm not sure if I regret it or not. I probably shouldn't have, and I defiantly shouldn't have arrived a day early, because the second she got me on my own, the little resolve I had mustered crumbled, as she cupped my naked self in her tricky hands.

And afterwards, after the pleasure, after the temporary filling-in of the hole in my chest, there was nothing but guilt left as we lay next to each other, her breasts against my back. I couldn't tell what she was feeling. Remorse perhaps, regret? I didn't let myself think for even a second she was satisfied with what she had done, and on the night before her wedding no less.

"I really shouldn't have come."

"No," she mumbled, "you really shouldn't have."

And so I left. I didn't show up for the ceremony, or the reception. I just did what I always try to do. Just get out of her life. I've been gone for ten years now,but I still remember that last night as though it were moments ago.

"Goodbye Jade."

"No, stay."

But I can't stay.

My heart cannot be broken into even smaller pieces, least it not continue to function. Least I not continue to function.

**Xxxx**

**It's much better to face these kind of things,**

**With a sense of poise and rationality.**

* * *

_I'm sorry it's not all that long, but I didn't want to keep writing the same thing over and over (they have sex, they say they'll stop, they don't stop). On that note, the next chapter will be the fourth and final chapter, and take a different turn. It will probably be quite long, another reason for the shortness of this chapter, and it will be completed in the next week or two._

_The song for this chapter was: I Write Sins, Not Tragedies, by Panic! At The Disco. You don't have to listen to it to understand the chapter, in fact it was mostly the video that drove this chapter more than the song itself. _

_Have a good one!_


End file.
